remained, and seeing Carter by the SUV with two other similarly dressed men, and seeing there
weren't many others off the bus, he went to talk to Carter.
Carter was again smoking a cigarette, and had somehow procured a cup of coffee in a paper
cup. No steam was rising from it, so Joe didn't know why he bothered.
"Food's not here yet," said Carter. The other two men locked eyes on Joe ad said nothing.
"What's happening here?" said Joe
"Processing."
"Processing what?"
"Processing you. Checking you for communicable diseases and other things that might be of
interest to the Commonwealth."
"And then what?"
Carter poured his coffee out on the ground. "Then you live."
"In the Commonwealth."
"Yeah. In the Commonwealth."
Just then lights came up, headlights on the Northeast. Three or four pairs. Joe gave Carter a
fearful glare. Carter smiled. Joe thought of going back to the bus, but could see no point in it. He
figured Carter would let him watch, for the sake of a cigarette friendship, before the end came. Or
maybe he would shoot him first.
The headlights pulled up, and Joe saw some men get off the bus. They stepped off and away
and they watched like characters in an old sci-fi movie, greeting beings from another world in the light.
Others stayed on the trucks, peering out the windows as if they could do something if the fear in their
guts, that they were being dragged out here to be shot for no good reason, became real, or maybe
resigning themselves to that fact.